With ruling 1193/2026 the Puglia administrative court requires a municipality to decide on an owner's application for land whose planning restrictions have lapsed. A known principle with a larger effect on 'white zone' values than is often assumed.
On 24 September the Puglia regional administrative court (TAR) published ruling 1193/2026 on a situation familiar to anyone dealing in land. An owner asks the municipality to give a new planning designation to a plot whose restrictions have lapsed; the municipality stays silent, or replies that the matter will be addressed in the new plan. The court upheld the appeal against the silence and set deadlines for the authority to examine the application and, if the outcome is positive, complete the rezoning procedure.
The principle is not new, but it bears on the value of a great deal of land.
What happens when a restriction lapses
A restriction aimed at expropriation lasts five years under Article 9 of the consolidated law on expropriation. Without a declaration of public utility within that period it lapses, and the land is left without effective rules: a "white zone". Pending new planning, case law largely applies the regime for municipalities without planning instruments set out in Article 9 of the consolidated building law. Within built-up areas, works up to restoration are allowed; outside them, new building too, but limited to 0.03 cubic metres per square metre.
On one hectare that is 300 cubic metres, roughly a small house.
The value of white-zone land therefore depends almost entirely on what the municipality decides next, and when.
Delay as a tool
The municipality can reimpose the restriction, but that requires reinforced reasoning and, since Constitutional Court ruling 179 of 1999, compensation. The Council of State confirmed in April, with ruling 2991/2026, that an authority cannot simply adopt an infrastructure project to reconfirm a restriction over an entire area. It can assign a different designation consistent with surrounding planning. Or it can do nothing and defer to a general plan that in many municipalities has been in preparation for years.
The third route is the most convenient and the cheapest for the authority. The Puglia court, in line with settled case law, holds that it is not available in generic form: deferral to the new plan is acceptable only with a defined procedural path, with recognisable steps and timing. Otherwise the silence is unlawful and the court can set a deadline, appointing a commissioner if the authority remains inactive.
Where the principle stops
In August the Council of State, with ruling 6409/2026, held that the ten-year expiry of a plan for productive settlements does not automatically turn the land into a white zone: what has been implemented stands, and the municipality may adopt a new plan. Not every expiry creates a vacuum, so before buying "released" land one needs to know which instrument expired and with what effect.
There is a more practical limit too. The ruling obliges the municipality to decide, not to decide in a particular way, and the answer may be a reasoned, compensated reimposition or a less favourable designation than hoped.
The price of waiting
For anyone valuing such land, time is the variable that matters most. On land with lapsed restrictions a buyer normally applies a discount, sometimes a steep one, reflecting both the uncertainty over its future designation and the length of the wait. The seller usually has less capacity to wait than a professional buyer. Case law that narrows indefinite deferral shortens the second variable and makes the first easier to read.
Planning risk remains, but it becomes measurable, and measurable risk can be priced.